Vietnam Veterans Memorial

Maya Lin
1980-82

When Maya Ying Lin was a senior at the Yale School of Architecture, her design was chosen from among more than 1400 submissions, some by world renown architects. The choice was immediately controversial, not only because of the non-traditional design but because the designer was both a woman and an Asian-American. The design was called a "black gash of shame" and a "giant tombstone." The memorial is "a rift in the earth" (Lin) made of two black granite walls, each 246 feet long, angled at 125 degrees. One wall points to the Washington Monument, the other to the Lincoln Memorial. As a response to those who wanted a more traditional and heroic memorial, officials erected Frederick Hart's Vietnam Veterans statue, visible in the center image below--far right.

Distant views

Each of the walls is comprised of 70 separate panels with the inscribed names of the 58,000+ killed during the war. The names are listed in chronological order from 1959 to 1975.